This vision through the peephole caused me reel back, rub my eyes and go for another look. Upon the second gaze, I was shocked to see the large warehouse room still situated right outside my front door. “Maybe I am not awake and this is just a dream, or maybe a mirage”, I thought to my self, “ Yes, a mirage is what I have encountered.” (You know how a mirage works, if you keep looking it will fade away.) I kept looking, and I kept looking ...and not only did it not fade away but the picture became clearer. At the far end of this large room was a single door, and leading to the door was long line of extremely questionable people slowly indexing through the door. From my vantage point I saw thugs, thieves, murderers, whores, transvestites, homosexuals, pedophiles, pimps, pushers, liars, loafers, and scoundrels of all shapes and sizes. There were unfaithful lovers, people haters, God haters, loose lipped perverts, religious hypocrites, punks, pranksters, and rebellious men and women of all ages and ethnic backgrounds (and the list went on). Each one seemed to carry an image of their lives with them so that even through the peephole I could get a brief juicy review of their sordid lives. The amazing thing was I was not shocked by the people I was seeing. They seemed comfortably familiar (though so surreal)due to the fact that I was able to recognize them and identify with them by their gross transgressions.
As I watched three things happened ... First, the parade ended by all the characters filing through the single door at the other end of this large warehouse room. Second, just as the last individual passed through the door it slammed shut. Third, the knock came again to my door but this time as an urgent pounding that caused me to reel back from the vibration. Something happened inside my soul at that moment. I felt like there has a desperate cry for help coming from the door at the other end of the large room outside my door peephole. So I boldly threw open my door and ran the distance between the two doors which suddenly seemed like the expanse of a football stadium. Never had I run with such urgency or purpose … I was somehow feeling that I was connected to the hope for a situation that was increasingly looking so much bigger than my “peephole” perspective.
After a run that seemed to last an eternity, I was now facing the door that so much dereliction had passed through. Winded and leaning forward against the door, I could hear sounds of happy childhood memories and of songs of a more innocent time. All my senses were challenged by a radiating comfort that seemed to ooze from the small openings between the door and its framing … the smells, the sympathetic vibrations were causing anticipations of hope that only come at fleeting moments on this side of Heaven. All my senses were screaming “Home”. “Home?”
At this point I fell to my face and rejoiced for there before the threshold of The Door were words emanating for my heart to hear … Words that I have heard and understood throughout my days with Jesus … “Come unto me, all ye that labor”... “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes”... “Behold, I make all things new” … “Call the maimed, the lame, the halt and the blind and thou shalt be blessed”... “Father to the fatherless” … “Behold, I stand at the door and knock ….” . “If any man be in Christ he is a new creation” … “Come now let us reason together, though your sins be as scarlet they shall be white as snow” … “I am the Good Shepherd, my sheep hear my voice” … “I am the Resurrection and the Life” … “ I am the Way, the Truth, the Life” …
“I am the Door, by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved”.
I awoke to find my pillow soaked with tears but I was so refreshed in knowing that the dream actually carried my heart to His heart. Oh if only we could see beyond the “peephole”. If only we could go through the open door. If only we could come face to face with the soiled, sordid life of so many pillaged and plundered by sin, and realize there go I … and I could go to them and with them … to Him. Oh the Joy of living for others!!!!
Run to the broken ones, O beautiful feet,
To carry His Heart's Gospel ...
the Song to the broken
that makes them complete.
HLFA,
Jeff
PS … I may not have a peephole, but the ornate window in my front door can still separate me from the movement after the knock.